


The Last Resort of Good Men

by Kitty_Drakeheart



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, BFFs, Blood Magic, Dorian Pavus Has Issues, Gen, Male-Female Friendship, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-25
Updated: 2015-10-25
Packaged: 2018-04-28 01:07:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5072083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kitty_Drakeheart/pseuds/Kitty_Drakeheart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Companion piece for 'To The End' but will stand alone without much context.</p>
<p>A short fic from Dorian's PoV upon returning to Skyhold after the meeting with his father in Redcliffe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Resort of Good Men

**Author's Note:**

> This one-shot serves two purposes- it gives people more Dorian PoV since everyone seems to enjoy it so much! And secondly, I really wanted to write it but it didn't really have a space in the main story. For anyone who isn't reading 'To The End' the Inquisitor is Sylvie Trevelyan, a quick tempered mage who likes Cullen Rutherford and setting things on fire. This scene takes place 'off screen' during Chapter 21, when Sylvie takes her sweet time going to the war room.

It had probably been a mistake- going to Redcliffe- Dorian realised as he came to stand by the window of his nook in the library. He was grateful that Sylvie had told him the truth about their trip before they even left Skyhold and not kept in secret like Mother Giselle had requested. Dorian had a sneaking suspicion that Sylvie had literally marched from the main hall and up the stairs to find him within seconds of her conversation with the Mother. He could see his friend from the window, chatting animatedly with Ambassador Montiliyet as the Antivan scribbled furiously on her ledger. No doubt they were cataloguing everything they had brought back from Redcliffe- something Sylvie certainly hadn't thought to do. Kill the dragon- make shiny new things! That was about as far as she got in her planning.

Even  _without_ the meeting with his father it had been a difficult trip. The discovery of just how the artifacts called Oculara were made ...the bandits still roaming wild ...the displaced refugees still struggling ...after everything they witnessed the declaration that they were going to fight a  _dragon_ had actually been welcome one. It had been equally both terrifying and exhilarating and a much needed distraction. As the spells had flown and The Iron Bull's war cries had wrung out across the valley, Dorian had felt marginally more like himself and much less like the scared disappointment he always felt like when in his fathers presence.

He leaned his head heavily against the window frame and sighed. He wasn't sure what he had been expecting when he walked into that tavern but it was certainly  _not_ the appearance of his father instead of this so called family retainer. Oh how the other Magisters would scoff at the thought of Halward Pavus  _slumming_ it in a Fereldan inn. The fact that he was there at all was the only reason Dorian had held off on storming straight out the door. His father would have been unable to abide the stench of horses, dogs and old ale ...how long would he have persevered before giving up and going home to Tevinter? Of course, Lord Pavus had been the picture of politeness- apologising to Sylvie for having gotten her involved before having the audacity to essentially imply that Dorian's joining the Inquisition was some how  _his_ doing ...that it was no more than some childish act of rebellion.

Dorian's anger had got the better of him, an unstoppable rant spilling forth as he revealed to his best, and perhaps  _only,_ friend the details of exactly what Halward Pavus had chosen to do when his precious heir refused to play pretend. Footsteps behind him made Dorian glance over his shoulder, unsurprised to see Sylvie stepping around the small table and into the alcove. He had refused to talk about what had happened while there were still out in the field, unwilling to risk being overheard by a hulking brute and a brooding Grey Warden, neither of whom were particularly fond of him, but he knew he wouldn't be able to avoid the conversation for ever, not when dealing with the most stubborn woman he had ever had the joy of befriending.

"Don't you have a war room to be in?" Dorian remarked, still looking out the window. "Or some handsome Commander who needs reassured that you weren't eaten by a dragon?"

"Yes to the first one ...and I'm pretty sure if that dragon had eaten me then Cullen would have been one of the first to know. I asked Josephine to wait for me in her office while I attended to a more pressing issue." Sylvie said, causing Dorian to snort.

"A pressing issue? I don't believe I've ever been called  _that_ before..." After a few moments of silence he heard Sylvie sigh behind him.

"Do you want to talk about it?" She asked, sitting herself down in one of the chairs.

"Not especially." Dorian replied, looking back out the window to where various people were unloading the pilfered corpse of the dragon they had killed. "However, I can't imagine you will leave me alone until I do." He looked over his shoulder and gave her the smallest of smirks.

"If you  _really_ want to keep everything all bottled up inside then I won't stop you ...I'll just be silently annoyed at you." She replied, tucking her legs beneath her on the chair. Dorian let out a dry chuckle.

"Do you even know  _how_ to be silently annoyed? I thought you much preferred stomping around and swearing about it." He quipped, pushing himself off of the wall and moving to sit in the chair beside Sylvie's. Sighing, he leaned his head back, staring up at the ceiling. "He says we're alike. Too much pride. Once I would have been overjoyed to hear him say that ...now I'm not certain." Dorian closed his eyes, giving an involuntary shake of his head. "I don't know if I can forgive him."

"No one would blame you for that." Sylvie said softly. "What he did..."

"He did out of desperation." Dorian interrupted, opening his eyes to look at her. "I wouldn't put on a show, marry the girl, keep everything  _unsavoury_ private and locked away. Selfish, I suppose, not to want to spend my entire life screaming on the inside." Sylvie's expression darkened at his words and he could feel the brief of surge of her mana flickering just beneath the surface. She had reacted much the same inside the tavern and, as concerning as it was that the Inquisitor was inches from charring his father to cinders, Dorian had loved her for it in that instant.

"And yet you still defend him." She hissed, fingers clenching tightly on the arms of the chair as she clearly fought to keep her terrible temper in check.

"He is my father." Dorian replied flatly. "We cannot choose our family ...a point proven by my having a father who was willing to do a blood ritual to alter my mind and make me ...acceptable." He turned slightly to look back out the window, midday sun obscured by light clouds. Even after all this time the pain of that knowledge stung uncontrollably in his heart.

"Can blood magic even do that?" Sylvie asked, her tone only marginally less angry than it had been. Dorian shrugged, folding his arms across his chest.

"Maybe. It could also have left me a drooling vegetable." He hung his head, closing his eyes again, willing the old pain away. "It crushed me to think he found that absurd risk preferable to scandal. Part of me has always hoped he didn't really want to go through with it. If he had ...I can't even imagine the person I would be now. I wouldn't like  _that_ Dorian." He felt a warm hand enclose his and, turning his hand over, laced his fingers with Sylvie. It was grounding, comforting, to know there was finally someone in his life who knew all of his unpleasant little secrets and didn't flinch away, wouldn't think any less of him for it. She really  _was_ turning him into an unbearable sap.

"Are you all right?" She asked. Dorian looked at her, green eyes staring at him with concern.

"No. Not really." He replied honestly, there was no point in lying to her when she would see right through him. "But ...thank you for bringing me out there. It wasn't what I was expecting but ...it's something. I  _do_ wish you hadn't had to witness my little meltdown, however. Maker knows what you must think of me now, after that whole display." Dorian didn't  _really_ think that Sylvie would judge him for what had happened, she had already known about his preference for men and didn't so much as bat an eye but part of him ...part of him just needed the confirmation that nothing had changed between them, that she didn't think any of less of him in the light of his family history. Blood magic was a significantly worse crime here in the South and he couldn't bare the possibility that she may consider him guilty by association.

"Dorian, I think you are ridiculously ...wonderfully brave." She said firmly. Dorian felt his eyebrows shoot up his forehead. He had heard a great many word used in description of him but...

"Brave?" He repeated incredulously. "The wonderful thing I whole heartedly agree with, of course, but ...brave?" Sylvie smiled at him, perhaps a little  _too_ indulgently- like he was a slow child struggling to count.

"Yes,  _brave_ ." She repeated. "What you did- abandoning tradition to walk your own path ...you basically held up two fingers and said 'fuck you, Tevinter' in order to be the person you've always known you are." Dorian couldn't help it, he positively  _beamed_ at Sylvie. He had joined the Inquisition because it was the right thing to do and yet here he was, side by side with a woman who had wormed her way so deftly into his heart that he was now willing to stand against a  _god_ with her.

"Right, enough of the syrupy stuff- it's all going to set my teeth on edge." He declared, letting go of Sylvie's hand. "I'm of a mind to drink myself into a drunken stupor. It's been that sort of week."

"For all of us, I think." Sylvie agreed, getting up from the chair. He had to admit that he was more than a little disappointed to see that she was leaving. "We will all be in the tavern later, toasting the Inquisition's first dragon kill. Promise me you'll join us instead of wallowing up here alone."

"I do not wallow." Dorian scoffed, scowling at her. Sylvie merely chuckled and shook her head.

"You do ...so stop it."

"As you command, Inquisitor." He mocked, topping it off with a fake salute. She most childishly stuck her tongue out at him and turned away without another word. Dorian sighed, stretching out his legs and grabbing a nearby book, not really reading any of the words on the page he opened it at.

Dorian would never in a thousand years admit it to her face, but Sylvie was right. He  _had_ been wallowing most pitifully on their whole journey back to Skyhold. Kaffas! He had helped take down a  _dragon_ of all things! Snapping the book shut again, Dorian got to his feet and made his way down the stairs of the tower. He was going to celebrate and  _not_ simply get spectacularly drunk in an attempt to forget about the meeting with his father. Perhaps he would even find a tall, muscular soldier of a similar disposition to him who could  _thoroughly_ remind him of one of the many good reasons for leaving Tevinter.

 


End file.
